F-Gas Use Cases: Cooling & Electrical Insulation

Contents:

New Equipment & modification of existing equipment (including retrofit)

When designing or procuring new Equipment, or carrying out modifications to existing Equipment, Equipment responsible persons shall ensure that they use natural gases, low-GWP gases or alternative technologies instead of F-Gases where technically or economically feasible. They shall consult with the F-Gas management team, who will, in particular, review new experimental Equipment (including detectors) and provide support to find mitigation measures to ensure that the most effective and efficient set-up is implemented.

Where F-Gas substitution is not technically or economically feasible, apply the following recommendations while selecting equipment criteria:

Category

Recommendations

Conception or Market Selection

Target zero-emission objective Hermetic, air-tight design, including distribution network and pipes Guarantee maximum F-Gas recovery feasibility during maintenance, decommissioning, etc. Favour natural refrigerants or other technologies If technical or safety issues arise, F-Gases with low GWP can be considered (< 700, GWP list: EDMS # 3120836) PFAS-free alternatives to F-Gases are acceptable (N.B. most HFOs are also PFAS) Develop procedures for the decommissioning of the Equipment/installation

Notify f-gas-management@cern.ch in the following use cases:

• Purchase of new standard cooling Equipment, including the following details:
  • selection criteria retained
  • type of gas contained
  • analysis of market availability, including suppliers’ ranking and whether it is part of a group purchase (including relevant EDMS link).
• New experimental cooling Equipment: as early as possible in the conception/design phase: to discuss alternative solutions.
• New non-sealed electrical Equipment requiring SF₆: to discuss alternative solutions.

Storage of F-Gas bottles/tanks

Requirements	Information
Long term storage limited to: SF6 bottles: < 5 years Other F-Gas bottles: < 10 years	– Equipment seals deteriorate over time, compromising vessels’ leak-tightness – Transport of filled bottles is only permitted if the expiry date, indicated on the vessel, has not been reached
Storage Mass limited to: SF6 storage within a building: < 150 kg Other F-Gas storage: Within a building: < 1 tonne Single vessel: < 400 Litres	For questions please contact f-gas-management@cern.ch
Storage EAM registration	All Equipment containing F-Gas shall be declared and updated on the EAM platform (EAM or EAM light) according to the Monitoring chapter.
Leak detection campaign	Leak detection campaigns shall be carried out at least annually on any stored bottles/reservoir and information kept up to date accordingly in EAM
Bottles/vessels labelling	All Equipment shall bear a visible and durable label: Inventory number QR code linking the equipment to the EAM platform

Management & Monitoring

Equipment responsible persons shall ensure that the Equipment under their responsibility is duly registered together with its fluid information in the dedicated platform (EAM or EAM light).

1. Content Registration

After creation of your Equipment on EAM, the F-Gas information content shall be specified in the Fluid Information tab. This tab is visible for every piece of Equipment already registered on the platform.

A step-by-step guide is available under the “Monitoring” chapter.

2. Consumption & Operation Declaration

For each operation involving F-Gas movement, details shall be provided on Work Orders integrating the P-GAS01 taskplan checklist.

Part of this form is based on the French CERFA form for fluorinated gases operations (CERFA n°15497*04).

Section 1:

Specify the general information required if the operation requires a CERFA declaration form.

Section 2:

Verify if the current information in the Fluid Information tab is correct. If not, select “A corriger” and specify the correction in the comment field.

Section 3:

Select the type of operation to be declared in this Work Order.

Section 4:

Declare the ID and last control of the manual leak detector, if one is used during the operation.

Section 5:

Specify whether a permanent leak detector is installed near the Equipment.

Section 6:

Specify the location(s) of the leaks during the leak test and indicate whether they were repaired.

Section 7:

Specify whether the operation involves fluid input or input, as well as the quantity, name and type (virgin/recycled/regenerated).

For the output, provide the following declarations where applicable:

• BSFF (Trackdéchet) number
• Quantity for internal (CERN) usage
• Containers IDs

After completion of the Taskplan, you can generate your N° 15497*04 CERFA on this link by entering your Workorder number. (EN-IM is in the process of adding the link directly on EAM Light).

If you have any additional issue related to completing the form, please contact f-gas-team-management@cern.ch.

For any technical issues, please contact eam.support@cern.ch.

3. Annual validation

Each Equipment owner receives an annual notification in order to validate their stock and F-Gas movement data on the platform.

4. Reporting extraction

F-Gas stock, emission and disposal will be directly extracted from the EAM platform for statistics and monitoring purposes by HSE-ENV.

5. Training

Several training courses to learn more about the EAM platform are available on the learning Hub.

6. Physical label on the Equipment

All Equipment shall display the following EAM information by means of a visible and durable label:

Operation & Maintenance

Reminder: Personnel Handling F-Gases shall:

• complete the dedicated mandatory CERN e-learning course;
• receive CERN practical training if they are Handling research specific Equipment;
• hold the certifications required by applicable regulations in the Host Sates, if any.

Further information can be found in the “Training” chapter.

Only duly trained personnel are authorised to make connections of F-Gases to Equipment. They are therefore responsible for the connections they make and for verifying the integrity of their connections.

Additional instructions:

Instruction	Detail
Maintenance Procedure	– A maintenance procedure must be defined for each type of Equipment (similar Equipment can share the same procedure) – The procedure must be stored in EDMS and linked to the corresponding Equipment type on the EAM platform – The procedure must at least include the following: o Scheduling of interventions o List of personnel authorised to perform interventions o Leak checks periodicity
Intervention Register	– Must be managed through EAM Work Orders with HSE Checklist – Any F-Gas movement (e.g. fill, recovery for reuse, disposal: recycling or destruction) must be recorded in the relevant EAM Work Orders
F-Gas disposal for destruction	F-Gases recovered for destruction must only be removed from CERN sites by designated and trained CERN personnel or by those of the contractor responsible for the Equipment maintenance. If in doubt, contact f-gas-management@cern.ch

Leak detection & repair

Leak detection

Regular control of all F-Gas Equipment by trained personnel to detect gas leaks is mandatory. The control frequency for leaks depends on the quantity of tCO₂e of F-Gas contained within the Equipment (not applicable to sealed Equipment):

Leak repair

Please follow the recommendations applicable to each case:

F-Gas incidental/accidental release

Any Equipment responsible person shall develop a clear procedure covering accidental release events. The procedure must be stored in EDMS and cross-linked in the Equipment’s EAM entry.

Similar types of Equipment under the responsibility of the same person can refer to the same procedure.

The procedure shall be reviewed at least yearly in consultation with relevant stakeholders to ensure its practicality. Test drills with stakeholders to guarantee preparedness for quick and effective response shall also be performed.

The procedure shall at least include the following aspects:

Category	Description
Means to stop or minimise gas leaks	List the available means/methods to stop the gas supply to the Equipment/installation/facility or to minimise the gas leak, as soon all safety conditions are met.
F-Gas loss Assessment	List possible means/methods to assess the total F-Gas quantity released during the incident/accident.
Mandatory Incident Declaration	The incident shall be declared in EDH (Incident Declaration) and shall include at least: A brief, precise description of the incident/accident, The actions carried out to manage the incident/accident, including those to minimise F-Gas loss, The type and quantity (kg) of F-Gas or gas mixture emitted, Any other relevant information to help avoid recurrence. The mandatory EDH Incident Declaration document shall be linked to the Equipment’s EAM entry.